“Do you know what I shall do to-night?”
she answered. “Get out of my window by
the apple-tree, and go to the woods, and play!”

We were going down a steep lane, along the side of
a wood, where there’s always a smell of sappy
leaves, and the breath of the cows that come close
to the hedge to get the shade.

There was a cottage in the bottom, and a small boy
sat outside playing with a heap of dust.

“Hallo, Johnny!” said Pasiance.
“Hold your leg out and show this man your bad
place!” The small boy undid a bandage round
his bare and dirty little leg, and proudly revealed
a sore.

“Isn’t it nasty?” cried Pasiance
ruefully, tying up the bandage again; “poor
little feller! Johnny, see what I’ve brought
you!” She produced from her pocket a stick
of chocolate, the semblance of a soldier made of sealing-wax
and worsted, and a crooked sixpence.

It was a new glimpse of her. All the way home
she was telling me the story of little Johnny’s
family; when she came to his mother’s death,
she burst out: “A beastly shame, wasn’t
it, and they’re so poor; it might just as well
have been somebody else. I like poor people,
but I hate rich ones—­stuck-up beasts.”

Mrs. Hopgood was looking over the gate, with her cap
on one side, and one of Pasiance’s cats rubbing
itself against her skirts. At the sight of us
she hugged herself.

Pasiance tossed her head, snatched up the cat, and
ran indoors. I remained staring at Mrs. Hopgood.

“Dear-dear,” she clucked, “poor
lamb. So to spake it’s—­”
and she blurted out suddenly, “chuckin’
full of wra-ath, he is. Well, there!”

My courage failed that evening. I spent it at
the coastguard station, where they gave me bread and
cheese and some awful cider. I passed the kitchen
as I came back. A fire was still burning there,
and two figures, misty in the darkness, flitted about
with stealthy laughter like spirits afraid of being
detected in a carnal-meal. They were Pasiance
and Mrs. Hopgood; and so charming was the smell of
eggs and bacon, and they had such an air of tender
enjoyment of this dark revel, that I stifled many
pangs, as I crept hungry up to bed.

In the middle of the night I woke and heard what I
thought was screaming; then it sounded like wind in
trees, then like the distant shaking of a tambourine,
with the high singing of a human voice. Suddenly
it stopped—­two long notes came wailing
out like sobs—­then utter stillness; and
though I listened for an hour or more there was no
other sound ....